Embodiments of the invention concern the control of performance of water retention devices, particularly those installed or intended to be fitted upstream of gas turbines.
As used herein, “water retention device” includes a device configured to stop the water droplets in an air flow from crossing the device. Furthermore, it includes coalescers, separators of droplets by inertia, or through baffles.
The coalescer devices are necessary in surroundings with a high concentration of humidity in the air, in order to remove humidity. A coalescer operates by trapping the small droplets of water in the fibers. The water particles captured combine with other particles to form larger drops of water. The coalescers are designed either to allow the droplets to flow towards the bottom of the device by gravity, or in a manner that they are released in the airflow current in order to be captured downstream by a separator.
In a turbine, the droplets of water contained in the air inflow are likely to damage the compressor blades. Thus, a water retention device is placed upstream of the turbine to prevent the entry of the droplets of water in the compression phases.
A problem occurs due to the fact that the water retention device, whose function is to stop the droplets of water contained in an airflow, also stops a part of the dust particles contained in the flow. This causes the device to clog and increases the related impedance loss. This impedance loss may lead to the shutdown of the turbine.
To compensate for this inconvenience, one must arrange a water retention device in a manner that it is capable of fulfilling its main function, i.e., stopping the droplets of water, while capturing the least possible amount of dust particles.